Researchers risk fire, explosion or poisoning by allowing AI to design experiments, warn scientists. The use of AI models in scientific laboratories risks enabling dangerous experiments that could cause fires or explosions, researchers have warned. Such models offer a convincing illusion of understanding but are susceptible to missing basic and vital safety precautions. In tests of 19 cutting-edge AI models, every single one made potentially deadly mistakes. Serious accidents in university labs are rare but certainly not unheard of.

In the future, tiny flying robots could be deployed to aid in the search for survivors trapped beneath the rubble after a devastating earthquake. So far, aerial microrobots have only been able to fly slowly along smooth trajectories, far from the swift, agile flight of real insects -- until now. MIT researchers have demonstrated aerial microrobots that can fly with speed and agility that is comparable to their biological counterparts. A collaborative team designed a new AI-based controller for the robotic bug that enabled it to follow gymnastic flight paths, such as executing continuous body flips. With a two-part control scheme that combines high performance with computational efficiency, the robot's speed and acceleration increased by about 450 percent and 250 percent, respectively, compared to the researchers' best previous demonstrations.

Self-driving laboratories (SDLs) have accelerated the throughput and automation capabilities for discovering and improving chemistries and materials. Although these SDLs have automated many of the steps required to conduct chemical and materials experiments, a commonly overlooked step in the automation pipeline is the handling and reloading of substrates used to transfer or deposit materials onto for downstream characterization. Here, we develop a closed-loop method of Automated Substrate Handling and Exchange (ASHE) using robotics, dual-actuated dispensers, and deep learning-driven computer vision to detect and correct errors in the manipulation of fragile and transparent substrates for SDLs. Using ASHE, we demonstrate a 98.5% first-time placement accuracy across 130 independent trials of reloading transparent glass substrates into an SDL, where only two substrate misplacements occurred and were successfully detected as errors and automatically corrected. Through the development of more accurate and reliable methods for handling various types of substrates, we move toward an improvement in the automation capabilities of self-driving laboratories, furthering the acceleration of novel chemical and materials discoveries.

Modern science advances fastest when thought meets action. LabOS represents the first AI co-scientist that unites computational reasoning with physical experimentation through multimodal perception, self-evolving agents, and Extended-Reality(XR)-enabled human-AI collaboration. By connecting multi-model AI agents, smart glasses, and robots, LabOS allows AI to see what scientists see, understand experimental context, and assist in real-time execution. Across applications -- from cancer immunotherapy target discovery to stem-cell engineering and material science -- LabOS shows that AI can move beyond computational design to participation, turning the laboratory into an intelligent, collaborative environment where human and machine discovery evolve together.

Self-driving laboratories offer a promising path toward reducing the labor-intensive, time-consuming, and often irreproducible workflows in the biological sciences. Yet their stringent precision requirements demand highly robust models whose training relies on large amounts of annotated data. However, this kind of data is difficult to obtain in routine practice, especially negative samples. In this work, we focus on pipetting, the most critical and precision sensitive action in SDLs. To overcome the scarcity of training data, we build a hybrid pipeline that fuses real and virtual data generation. The real track adopts a human-in-the-loop scheme that couples automated acquisition with selective human verification to maximize accuracy with minimal effort. The virtual track augments the real data using reference-conditioned, prompt-guided image generation, which is further screened and validated for reliability. Together, these two tracks yield a class-balanced dataset that enables robust bubble detection training. On a held-out real test set, a model trained entirely on automatically acquired real images reaches 99.6% accuracy, and mixing real and generated data during training sustains 99.4% accuracy while reducing collection and review load. Our approach offers a scalable and cost-effective strategy for supplying visual feedback data to SDL workflows and provides a practical solution to data scarcity in rare event detection and broader vision tasks.

Optics is foundational to research in many areas of science and engineering, including nanophotonics, quantum information, materials science, biomedical imaging, and metrology. However, the design, assembly, and alignment of optical experiments remain predominantly manual, limiting throughput and reproducibility. Automating such experiments is challenging due to the strict, non-negotiable precision requirements and the diversity of optical configurations found in typical laboratories. Here, we introduce a platform that integrates generative artificial intelligence, computer vision, and robotics to automate free-space optical experiments. The platform translates user-defined goals into valid optical configurations, assembles them using a robotic arm, and performs micrometer-scale fine alignment using a robot-deployable tool. It then executes a range of automated measurements, including beam characterization, polarization mapping, and spectroscopy, with consistency surpassing that of human operators. This work demonstrates the first flexible, AI-driven automation platform for optics, offering a path towards remote operation, cloud labs, and high-throughput discovery in the optical sciences.

Mobile robotic chemists are a fast growing trend in the field of chemistry and materials research. However, so far these mobile robots lack workflow awareness skills. This poses the risk that even a small anomaly, such as an improperly capped sample vial could disrupt the entire workflow. This wastes time, and resources, and could pose risks to human researchers, such as exposure to toxic materials. Existing perception mechanisms can be used to predict anomalies but they often generate excessive false positives. This may halt workflow execution unnecessarily, requiring researchers to intervene and to resume the workflow when no problem actually exists, negating the benefits of autonomous operation. To address this problem, we propose PREVENT a system comprising navigation and manipulation skills based on a multimodal Behavior Tree (BT) approach that can be integrated into existing software architectures with minimal modifications. Our approach involves a hierarchical perception mechanism that exploits AI techniques and sensory feedback through Dexterous Vision and Navigational Vision cameras and an IoT gas sensor module for execution-related decision-making. Experimental evaluations show that the proposed approach is comparatively efficient and completely avoids both false negatives and false positives when tested in simulated risk scenarios within our robotic chemistry workflow. The results also show that the proposed multi-modal perception skills achieved deployment accuracies that were higher than the average of the corresponding uni-modal skills, both for navigation and for manipulation.

Recent advances in robotics and autonomous systems have broadened the use of robots in laboratory settings, including automated synthesis, scalable reaction workflows, and collaborative tasks in self-driving laboratories (SDLs). This paper presents a comprehensive development of a mobile manipulator designed to assist human operators in such autonomous lab environments. Kinematic modeling of the manipulator is carried out based on the Denavit Hartenberg (DH) convention and inverse kinematics solution is determined to enable precise and adaptive manipulation capabilities. A key focus of this research is enhancing the manipulator ability to reliably grasp textured objects as a critical component of autonomous handling tasks. Advanced vision-based algorithms are implemented to perform real-time object detection and pose estimation, guiding the manipulator in dynamic grasping and following tasks. In this work, we integrate a vision method that combines feature-based detection with homography-driven pose estimation, leveraging depth information to represent an object pose as a $2$D planar projection within $3$D space. This adaptive capability enables the system to accommodate variations in object orientation and supports robust autonomous manipulation across diverse environments. By enabling autonomous experimentation and human-robot collaboration, this work contributes to the scalability and reproducibility of next-generation chemical laboratories

What makes a place seem'haunted'? Psychology, setting, and the power of suggestion all help make certain places feel more spooky. From the ghost of Al Capone to the crying Lady in Green, many otherworldly entities are said to populate Alcatraz Island. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. With its long history of incarceration, brutal conditions, and several grisly murders, the stories of hauntings on Alcatraz Island are a dime a dozen.

Abstract--Chemistry, a long-standing discipline, has historically relied on manual and often time-consuming processes. While some automation exists, the field is now on the cusp of a significant evolution driven by the integration of robotics and artificial intelligence (AI), giving rise to the concept of the robochemist: a new paradigm where autonomous systems assist in designing, executing, and analyzing experiments. Robo-chemists integrate mobile manipulators, advanced perception, teleoperation, and data-driven protocols to execute experiments with greater adaptability, reproducibility, and safety. Rather than a fully automated replacement for human chemists, we envisioned the robochemist as a complementary partner that works collaboratively to enhance discovery, enabling a more efficient exploration of chemical space and accelerating innovation in pharmaceuticals, materials science, and sustainable manufacturing. This article traces the technologies, applications, and challenges that define this transformation, highlighting both the opportunities and the responsibilities that accompany the emergence of the robochemist. Ultimately, the future of chemistry is argued to lie in a symbiotic partnership where human intuition and expertise is amplified by robotic precision and AI-driven insight. The field of chemistry, a cornerstone of modern science and industry, has long been characterized by a blend of theoretical insight and practical, hands-on experimentation.